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Google has stopped censoring images of the Tiananmen Square massacre on its Chinese website.

Users on Google.cn’s image search can now see the iconic picture of Tank Man, among other images from the massacre in the Beijing square in 1989 – just as users on Google’s other country portals, such as Google.co.uk, can.

Students and intellectuals protested communist rule for seven weeks in the square in 1989 in the face of a brutal security crackdown. Roughly 100,000 people are believed to have taken part in the protests – with up to 3,000 of those killed during the demonstrations.

Tank Man: One of the most iconic images of the Tiananmen Square massacre, that of a man standing alone and defenceless in a face off against four tanks, now appears on Google.cn

Previously, the images search on Google’s China website did not show images from the massacre.

But Google has lifted the veil on the images within the last 24 hours as it squares off against Beijing in a row over censorship and hacking.

China stood firm today in its demand that foreign firms adhere to state censorship rules after Google sparked the diplomatic spat by threatening to quit the country.

The U.S. web giant’s announcement yesterday that it would abandon voluntarily censoring its Chinese service was backed by President Barack Obama.